I have been covering political boycotts frequently since the inception of this blog, including the Prop 8 boycotts, the Mormon Boycott, the DNC boycott, the Beck boycott, the King & Spalding boycott, boycotts of various states for various reasons, the anti-Israel boycotts, and so on.

So when the boycott of Rush Limbaugh started as a result of his comments about Sandra Fluke, I took an interest.

There has been a lot of coverage regarding my post, Media Matters astroturfed the Limbaugh secondary boycott. The post was based in substantial part on interviews given by Angelo Carusone, Director of Online Strategy for Media Matters, who was not bashful in claiming credit for Limbaugh’s loss of advertisers, particularly in the early days of the boycott.

The post was linked by Instapundit and others and had gained a lot of attention by the time Limbaugh used it for his first tweet.

In response to the Limbaugh tweet, a non-Media Matters group called Boycott Rush, organized by former congressional candidate Krystal Ball and someone who tweets under the name @shoq, asserted that it started its efforts before and independent of Media Matters. Among other things, I was falsely accused of working for and being paid by Limbaugh to tarnish the anti-Rush movement by tying it to Media Matters. A comment also was made about my “professional future” (these tweets are from March 18):

When Rush later tweeted an image from the Boycott Rush groups web page (called The Stop Rush Project) showing how advertisers were targeted in an organized way, @shoq posted this message (the link has the full message, this is an excerpt):

Limbaugh Says This Site Is Some Kind Of “Astroturfed” Campaign. Is it?

No, and such nonsense is one more silly thing he’s said lately that just makes him look desperate to suggest there’s some conspiracy to persecute him and deny him his free speech rights. He just “says it,” knowing his thousands of loyal supporters will eagerly to repeat it. But what else is he going to say? That women speaking for millions of other women and citizens who are just fed up with his brand of “entertainment” are acting forcefully, and organically?

Probably 75% of the 40 volunteers on this site are women. Many of them have waited years to take aim at this infamous misanthropic bully, and Krystal’s petition got so much traction, so fast, that it was pretty evident that this #stoprush movement was going to be their moment to act. And act they have. Within two days, this site documented dozens of independent projects that would zeroing in on this issue and Rush Limbaugh.

Carusone and Media Matters also issued statements to Politico denying that they “controlled” Boycott Rush or the Stop Rush Project, and insisting that their efforts were independent of those volunteer efforts:

I must admit. I am pleased to see that Rush Limbaugh is highlighting the breadth and depth of the efforts to deliver accountability for his irresponsible multi-day smearing of Sandra Fluke. As evidence of so-called “astroturf,” Mr. Limbaugh tweeted a screenshot of a site that actually completely undermines his claim. The site he showed a picture of is in not a Media Matters site; a cursory review of it shows that it was started by and maintained by a group of volunteers who want accountability for Limbaugh.

First, Mr. Limbaugh dismissed his advertiser losses as a couple of french fries. Despite his claims that everything was fine, he apparently hired a crisis manager. Now, as evidence of astroturf, Mr. Limbaugh highlights a group of volunteers working on Rush related efforts.

In a follow-up email, Carusone stated again that the Stop Rush Project website was not his.

UPDATE: The site is created and organized by Shoq, “a well known progressive advocate on Twitter and Facebook.” Jess Levin, a spokesperson for Media Matters, confirms that Carusone controls only the StopRush.org website and the @StopRush Twitter account.

This claim that Media Matters was not involved in the Stop Rush Project, and the false accusations made against me, caused me to go back to the Twitter histories of the participants to document their interactions.

Those Twitter histories, combined with other public information, demonstrate early and frequent coordination of efforts between Media Matters (through Carusone) and the Boycott Rush group. Here’s the history:

On February 29, when Limbaugh mentioned those two words, Carusone, was ready to move based on research he had done on Limbaugh’s advertisers, using a template he created for pressuring Glenn Beck advertisers over two years. Using the @StopBeck username, Carusone decided to activate @StopRush (the link in the top tweet is to a Media Matters report on Rush’s comments):

By Carusone’s account in interviews he gave, Carusone began contacting advertisers on March 1, and those efforts paid off quickly. As reported by Businessweek:

A day after Rush Limbaugh called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke “a slut,” Angelo Carusone, a Washington-based activist, began contacting advertisers to boycott Limbaugh’s show — over the phone, via e-mail, through Twitter Inc. and on Facebook Inc. (FB) ….

(Based on the dates of embedded links, the DailyKos anti-Rush petition did not start until several days later.)

By March 2, however, Carusone already was showing results, and the Boycott Rush participants were communicating with Carusone both as to strategy and relying on Media Matter’s databases and ability to confirm advertisers:

On March 2, both @shoq and Krystal Ball had a conversation with Carusone about the boycott, in particular as to the use of Twitter, “Just got off the phone with @StopRush & @KrystalBall1. Punking @rushlimbaugh is a sport our whole Twitter family can enjoy! #p2”. (“#p2 is a hashtag favored by liberals):

By March 3, it was clear that @StopRush (Carusone) was in the lead, with others following his unique knowledge of social media boycott techniques and access to Media Matters information:

By March 4, after Carbonite had dropped Limbaugh the night before, the Boycott Rush folks still looked to Carusone, who @shoq described being “most in sync with”:

There also were “Direct Messages” used which would not be public unlike tweets. @shoq requested at least three times, on March 5, 6 and 8, that @StopRush (Carusone) switch from public view to DM’s. It may be that they discussed the weather or something unrelated to boycott strategy, but that seems unlikely in context:

And another conversation on March 10:

These communications represent the minimum number of contacts; there could have been other communications not reflected in tweets.

There is other evidence of coordination.

An Update (image below) at the bottom of the original Boycott Rush website directs readers to another website, which then redirects to the Stop Rush Project web page. That Update tells supporters “to let Shoq Value and Media Matters” know about other boycott efforts because they were “trying to connect them all for info sharing, etc”:

The StopRush Project now contains only a partial view of their tactical spreadsheet of advertisers. When the website first went public on March 7 (that date is based on the earliest page dates at the website), however, additional information was within public view and was captured in screenshots taken by a blogger at Pundit House:

WBEC Vice President Peter Barry said his decision to cut Limbaugh has been met with overwhelming support from the station’s listeners:

“We have been inundated with calls and emails of support,” Barry told ABC News. “There have been probably 50 calls of support for every one call disagreeing with the decision.”

C’mon… there is no way liberals outnumber conservatives 50 to 1 in the talk radio audience. Knowing that statement to be bogus, I searched and found a left-wing site that provided me with a link to a Google doc containing Rush’s sponsors. Except this Google doc had people working on it right before my eyes and two had filled in their own email address for the organization.In a few moments the number of viewers ticked up to around 12 and then I thought the end was near so I grabbed this screenshot:

The full screenshot is at the link, but here’s the key part for this purpose, the left hand column which no longer is visible, showing that the group was relying on Media Matters verificatino of advertisers:

This is consistent with the earlier tweets from March 2 that the Boycott Rush group was awaiting confirmation of advertisers from Media Matters.

It may be that theMedia Matters verification was public, yet it shows how dependent groups like Boycott Rush were on Media Matters to provide advertiser information. (As an aside, the Pundit House blog post asserts a connection to persons associated with the Obama campaign, but I think more evidence is needed before such a conclusion could be reached.)

So what does this all show?

Angelo Carusone of Media Matters was the band leader of the Stop Rush and Boycott Rush efforts. While Media Matters did not “control” the Boycott Rush group, there was meaningful coordination. In the first few days of the boycott effort there were multiple public and private communications between Carusone of MMFA and Boycott Beck regarding boycott strategy.

Carusone’s Beck boycott background and access to Media Matters databases of Limbaugh advertisers and resources made him an invaluable part of the anti-Limbaugh effort nationwide.

This also shows the power of social media, and how a relatively small number of people can create the appearance of a mass movement. When those efforts are stoked and coordinated by experienced boycott operatives with the resources of an organization like Media Matters behind them, the effect can be powerful and can scare away advertisers.

I’m normally suspicious of Media Matters, but in this case I believe Carusone’s braggadocio about the role of Media Matters in the Rush boycott movement.

Comments

Wow – textbook liberals astroturfing and their usual response when called out on it

“I’m not a shill but you are. I’m true grassroots but you are a paid troll. Ignore all the on-line traffic displaying the involvement of Media Matters. And by the way – nice professional career you have there – hate to see it affected by emails to your university.”

Sounds to me like overt threats. It’s behavior like this that tends to make people think that it is a waste of time to try and treat liberals & their positions with any level of respect.

Sooner or later the Right is going to have to change their ROE to respond in kind and if that takes boycotting companies who fold to pressure from the Left – so be it.

(And, once again, I ask: does ANY of this meet the threshold of RICO charges – i.e. racketeering (aka strong-arm/gangster intimidation tactics)? It is even more apparent, IMHO, now – this “interference with commerce”…..and #StopBeck/@StopBeck was a prior instance. Just wonderin’…..)

These are probably the same type of people who, when they were children, would throw a temper tantrum in the candy aisle until mom gave in. Now they are throwing a temper tantrum on a much larger scale.

My initial reaction to the claim of terrorism was to dismiss it, so I followed the link, and found something well beyond an effort to boycott.

Since when is gratuitous abuse of a company’s employees a reasonable part of a boycott?

What we are looking at is people who are acting like they know their position is both weak and unpopular. They resort to cheating in order to pretend more people agree with them than actually do. Because they cannot generate genuine support, they resort to whatever force they find. I still wouldn’t call it terrorism, but I’d definitely call it harassment, and actionable.

The appropriate response is to identify the malefactors, and the Professor has made a very good start on this. There is no such thing as true anonymity on the Internet, and people who send abusive, personal emails to employees should be outed by name, following the recent example by GatewayPundit.

While its technically no state-sponsored terrorism (not yet, at least),it would be accurate to describe the effort as party-sponsored terrorism.

The Democrats as a honorable political party disappeared long ago. They are truly the inheritors of their own history. They created the Klan. They are the party that invited communists and socialists into policy making. The community organizing, the astroturfing is nothing but a continuation of the dark, shady history of the Democrats. They are this nations Hamas, they are this nations Hezbollah. O.W.S. is their Muslim Brotherhood.

Abortion protestors sometimes target employees and doctors of abortion clinics for “monitoring” and abuse, as well. Do you think that’s okay? Because the sort of emails I’m reading about in no way reach the level of what some abortion protestors have done.

You’re missing one element, professor: I’d like to know when (if ever and under what circumstance) you would change your foolish position of opposing boycotts by the Right. Just how long should the Right practice “good manners” by turning the other cheek? I think you ought to devote at least one post to answering the question.

The funny part is that neither of you has put up any substantive arguments, and when I did the only retort was every moonbat debate tactic I’ve seen for the last six years… and now the backlash is simple ridicule when I wasn’t around.

As Professor Jacobson noted during his interview with African American Conservatives last night, boycotts by our side are probably unnecessry.

Rush’s sponsors who are being inundated by this phony astroturf campaign against Rush may decide it is just not worth it to advertside on ANY poliitcally oriented programming.

In other words, in their mean spirited attempt to hurt Rush, the unintended consequence may be that they’re simultaneously hurting their own cause if advertisers decide it’s just not worth it to advertise on political programming on either side.

I believe the start of the Stop Rush movement was not when he uttered those Two Words, but dates back far, far into the past when he uttered a different Two Words that caused rage and revenge to cascade along the nerve fibers of every liberal.

Tax Cuts

(Brrr) I can feel the chill from the Left even now. They will never forgive him for those horrid Two Words, were he to apologize from the top of the tallest building 24/7 for a full year, donate every penny of his vast estate to Planned Parenthood, and crawl on his belly to Hillary to beg. Far better the honest and truthful apology that he gave on the air, than the muttered one-line corrections the Times puts on page 35 for their front-page goofs.

Wait, stop hold on. These people are claiming it’s not astroturfing…but….From the Article
“Probably 75% of the 40 volunteers on this site are women. Many of them have waited years to take aim at this infamous misanthropic bully, and Krystal’s petition got so much traction, so fast, that it was pretty evident that this #stoprush movement was going to be their moment to act. And act they have.”

Now I may draw a fairly narrow line around “grassroots” but it seems to me if you have 30 people (unlike the writer of that article I can do basic math) waiting around “several years” to take advantage of a situation, regardless of their connection to any larger “PAC-kike” groups, it’s still not grass roots. Grass roots is populist, unorganized, widespread. By their own account they are bitter people who have clung to this for years.

A+ Professor!!!You totally did your homework!!! I’m glad I’m not one of your students because I would have failed due to a lack of proper research!!Your post on the astroturfing of Rush is a great read. I wish more people would see it.

The root of it all is the myriad of “think tanks” funded by persons like Soros and Sanfords. They dictate the dialogue of the media and the White House. For example–while reading the bio of Steve jobs by Walter Isaacson the completely fabricated quote by Rutherford B Hayes was cited as fact by the author. The author is the CEO of The Aspen Instituted, a sapling from the Center for American Progress Tree. Isaacson also served as the chairman of CNN. Obama just parrots what these communists feed him. Murdoch, Breitbart Limbaugh are the enemy.

This is excellent (and I’m sure time-consuming) work, but it appears to require more than a journalism degree from a liberal college to accurately follow. Will your reports ever be fact-checked by capable journalists and objectively reported in the dominant media?

Meanwhile the drum-beat narrative of Jacobson being Limbaugh’s shill will surely go on. What can be done about this rigged game? Even if the Left is outed on these lies, there are no adverse consequences. The real consequence is that the feeble @shoq has bogged down the Right’s formidable Prof. Jacobson in an almost endless he said/she said quagmire — because she maliciously challenged his professional integrity. And she PROSPERS from her monumental lack of integrity.

The court of popular opinion is the only place where any good comes from the exposition of the truth, Mark.

As always…

You and I take this to our friends, neighbors, family, etc. to show the truth from lies, and the method of the Collective in falsely shaping a narrative, and using deception to try to multiply their twisted influence.

You CAREFULLY use EFFECTIVE language…not histrionics…to teach and persuade.

Too often we seem to console ourselves with a feeble mantra that the Left never seems to need: “The truth will out.” When an inaccurate charge is made against a prominent democrat, an army of print and broadcast journalists rush to ferret out the error, restore damaged reputations and level condemnation on the purveyors of falsehoods. It doesn’t work that way in reverse. The Left’s purveyors of falsehoods seem to be rewarded, rather than reprimanded, for their service.

… Krystal Ball. Matt Black. Second one appears to be a pseudonym following an interesting naming pattern. Limbaugh comments and the Gulf oil spill… Is Shoq Value also Krystal Ball? A paid political MSNBC commentator and Democrat strategist? Youtube video, see former Candidate College media propagandist Krystal Ball on the panel Mastering the Media.

Amigo, play the race card (no, not human race) the antisemite race card. Shoq is obviously racist.
I read this column every morning first and thanks for the excellent analysis of what is happening in the world.
I mailed the Israel magnet to your office when you visited Dallas hoping you would post the picture-good bumpersnicker.

As for Palin Tweet and Facebook power, a Tweet from Sarah Palin gets lots more attention than EF Hutton. Her Facebook page has 3 million + fans or likes or members. Her Tweets are instantly launched to thousands and thousands.

WISCONSIN UNIONS ACT CHILDISHLY: “Seriously? Having a handful of high-school students counterprotest — even just in jest, which is what this seems to be — causes the union activists so much grief that they have to make nasty calls to the school? That doesn’t sound like a confident movement; it sounds like a bunch of crybabies that can dish out the protests but need to threaten people to keep them from speaking their own minds.”
–InstaPundit

It also sounds like people you really don’t need to fear too much.

Unless you think that kind of thing is too powerful to counter.

Which sounds to me like a joke…

Or you think OTHER people really are too stupid for self-government. (While you get it.)

The fact that one person employed from Media Matters was involved in the Rush Boycott doesn’t demonstrate that Media Matters controlled the Rush Boycott or that Media Matters coordinated the Rush Boycott. It means one person employed by Media Matters did that. Sorry, without more proof, I’m not buying what you’re selling Professor.

And I hardly think a comment asking you what client paid you for your work is a threat against your professional future, Professor. Have you become a teenaged drama queen?

If ever there was a blogger who eschews drama and neverloses his head, that would be Professor Jacobson.

Jimbo’s strawmen are of the poorest construction:

“And I hardly think a comment asking you what client paid you for your work is a threat against your professional future, Professor. Have you become a teenaged drama queen?”

That’s not the comment which indicates the threat. The tweet that indicates the threat is:

“In the interests of your political future, you really should reveal why you wrote that post”

How that can be read as anything but a threat of personal boycott is beyond me, which, of course, is why you assigned the root of the threat to a different comment – you had to. This tweet meant: Reveal your master or we will boycott your ass right out of Cornell. Lefties, of course, cannot conceive of a man operating from and by his own set of values and interests, without direction of an overarching controller.

Thank you for a terrific piece of work, professor; it was wonderful to see them running for cover by the end of the piece. Please, stay with it. It could be along, long summer for this crowd. (They are as grass roots as OWC.)

“Thank you for your request to look into possible violations of the 501(c)(3) status of Media Matters for America. We have received several requests along with yours and we are conducting a preliminary query at this time”.

If you have any additional information that you feel would be helpful please feel free to forward them to our office.”

[…] of the Progressive Left to silence opposition. If a plan to boycott a person (yes, a Person!) has been in an office drawer for over two years, it is not a boycott. It is bullying from well-funded thugs and mercenaries. In the case of […]